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The rise of cohabitation in family process among American young adults and declining rates of marriage among cohabitors are considered by some scholars as evidence for the importance of society-wide ideational shifts propelling recent changes in family. With data on two cohabiting cohorts from the NSFG 1995 and 2006-10, the current study finds that marriage rates among cohabitors have declined steeply among those with no college degree, resulting in growing educational disparities over time. Moreover, there are no differences in marital intentions by education (or race-ethnicity) among recent cohabitors. We discuss how findings of this study speak to the changes in the dynamics of social stratification system in the United States and suggest that institutional and material constraints are at least as important as ideational accounts in understanding family change and family behavior of contemporary young adults.

Over 40% of minor children in the U.S. currently rely primarily on their mothers’ earnings for financial support. Yet, cross sectional estimates seriously underestimate women’s lifetime odds of becoming their family’s primary earner. Using longitudinal data from the 2014 SIPP panels, we created annualized earnings to model transition rates into and out of primary-earning status among mothers. Results show, using a conservative threshold of at least 60% of total household earnings, over 70% of American mothers can expect to be primary earners at some point during their first 18 years of motherhood. On average, American mothers spend about four and half years in primary-earner status.

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